November 25, 2009

Hornet's nest

I came across this large hornet's nest while walking a long a stretch of the Grand River trail that separates the river from the deer ridge golf course. I found myself thinking a lot about a program I heard on CBC radio this morning. A biologist was speaking about the recent worldwide crashes in the bee population. One of the main problems is the rampant use of pesticides on our food, lawns and yes, golf courses. I thought of this as I observed the still perfect emerald green, weed free landscape of deer ridge. Would it be so terrible to ban pesticides? I think we could adapt to the presence of plants labeled as "weeds" by turf care specialists. I am not advocating getting rid of golf or nice lawns I just don't like the trade off of keeping such unnatural spaces. Bees are much too vital in the pollination process to continue to ignore the problem.